Pop Culture AHC: Better Hellraiser Franchise

While rewatching the S&M-flavoured horror franchise I came to a realization about half-way through the fifth film that, "oh jeez, these movies are kinda garbage".

Of course, I should have probably realized that the fifth and beyond movie in a horror franchise wouldn't be very good(direct to DVD will do that), but even a quick search on Google will reveal that the entire franchise - some nine movies - have made less than 90 million dollars all together.

The general consensus seems to be that while the first is a classic and the second isn't awful, the rest of the films to get exponentially more awful. So I ask, what can be done to save the series (which I really want to like more than I do) from being a cheap Asylum-tier joke?
 
Less gore, more atmospheric terror.
Lose all the special effects, they don't age well. Those flashes of light are laughable now.

More story, better actors, just a whole different movie. The core concept is the only thing that makes it survive at all. That is still pretty cool. So many ways to build a good movie on top of that. The actual execution of Hellraiser was meh at best.
 
The actual execution of Hellraiser was meh at best.

I'd definitely say that the first movie was the best conceived of the bunch. Definitely not perfect, but it had a better lock on what could have made the series great. The Cenobites appear just enough to be menacing, but their mystique isn't tarnished by trying to explain their world as the later movies did.

Rumour has it that the movies after the second were all repurposed spec scripts with Pinhead added. Keeping Barker and writing movies from scratch would help a great deal imo
 
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